Norton Releases Updated Anti-Malware Suite

Norton 2011 - High Scores in Malware Detection but also High Scores in False Positives

In conjunction with the release of a new study indicating that 65 percent of consumers worldwide and 73 percent of those in the U.S. have fallen victim to cybercrime, Norton from Symantec has released the latest editions of its solutions to the problem, Norton AntiVirus and Norton Internet Security 2011.

The company’s new, two-product suite received high marks in a third party product comparison test conducted by Dennis Technology Labs (and sponsored by Symantec). In that test, Norton was the only product out of ten tested to receive a 100 percent protection score, meaning that all malware threats were blocked. However, Norton scored highest in false positives as well.

The company also boasts success in two other recent tests. One was conducted by AV-Test.org, where Norton 2011 led twelve competitors in both detection and remediation of threats; the other by the independent security testing organization AV-Comparatives, where Norton received top scores.

Beyond accuracy and effectiveness, Norton claims superior performance, scanning speed and installation time for its suite based on third-party testing data from PassMark Software.

Norton’s products operate via a combination of reputation-based security that checks when and where programs originated, and behavioral security that identifies suspicious software based on its actions.

In addition to the for-sale products, Norton has announced a set of free downloadable tools for consumers, including one, Norton Power Eraser, which is specially designed to target and eliminate threats associated with fake antivirus or “scareware” programs.